SOURCE; "The American Wholegrain," in Times Literary Supplement, May 19, 1989, p. 535.

In the following review, Steiner offers a generally unfavorable assessment of A Prayer for Owen Meany.

Suppose that your best friend accidentally killed your mother with a Little League baseball. Suppose he was a near-midget whose voice never changed and whose parents believed he was the product of a virgin birth. Suppose he saw himself as God's instrument, knew the date of his death from a vision of his gravestone that appeared during a production of A Christmas Carol, and died a hero exactly as a dream of his foretold. Would this be enough to cement your faith in Christianity? John Irving's latest blockbuster, A Prayer for Owen Meany, poses this question. Needless to say, the book puts more than a little strain on the reader's ability to keep a straight face.